During a special session last night, the New York State Assembly passed a moratorium on issuing new permits for natural gas drilling by hydraulic fracturing (A11443B). Since the Senate has already passed its companion bill, S8129B, the measure now heads to the governor's desk. From the Ithaca Journal:
If the moratorium bill is approved by Paterson, drilling in the area would be halted until May 15 in order for the state to have a more complete picture of the extraction method's environmental impacts...
...The governor's office would not comment as to whether Paterson would sign the moratorium passed by the Assembly. But in an interview last week on public radio, Paterson indicated the state is not willing to move forward with drilling in the shale formation.
"... At this point, I would say that the hydrofracking, the opponents of it, have raised enough of an argument to thwart us from going forward at this time," Paterson said.
That radio interview the Ithaca newspaper mentioned? That was an appearance Paterson made on WAMC just before Thanksgiving, which caused a great stir amongst New York State environmental groups. (And inspired our talented cartoonist-in-residence, Gary Mayer, to take his pointed pen to the Guv and his successor last Sunday.)
Alas, not much else got done in Albany yesterday, where both the Assembly and the Senate weighed a laundry list of agenda items set before them by Gov. Paterson. (And by "weighed," we mean "ignored.") Key among them: a request by the governor to close a budget deficit of $315 million. The deficit remains un-closed, which means it's now governor-elect Andrew Cuomo's problem. From the Buffalo News:
Democrats in the Senate, who are poised to lose control of the 62-member chamber come January if current leads are maintained in two of three contested races, blamed Paterson for failing to provide them with enough information about his across-the-board cuts to education, Medicaid and other programs.
In the end, though, Senate Democrats were short one vote -- outgoing embattled Majority Leader Pedro Espada, who did not show up Monday -- and needed the support of Republicans to pass anything major. But GOP senators said they were cut out of all talks involving the deficit reduction plan.
"It's what we were supposed to do: work on the $315 million Democratic-created deficit," said Senate Republican Leader Dean Skelos after Democrats quickly gaveled out of session Monday night following a day of failed negotiations between the governor's office and lawmakers.
